Paper Based Encoding

The Reporting Wheel simplifies data reporting for remote workers

May 2012
-
Sep 2015

InSTEDD, SMS, IVR, Open Source, Data Collection

3 min

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Client

The genesis of the Reporting Wheel lies in the feedback obtained during usability tests performed for InSTEDD Geochat in Thailand and Cambodia, in order to arrive to a simple syntax that could allow health workers in remote areas to report infectious disease cases via SMS in a semi-structured way.

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Approach

The Reporting Wheel is a non-electronic device that simplifies data reporting for the most remote workers, including those with literacy challenges. It consists of small paper wheel that can “encode” a series of values or pictures into a number that can be reported through a phone call or a text message. A system on the other side will receive and collect the information, decode it and store it in a database.

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Results

Observing that many health workers in remote areas had trouble writing or receiving text messages, that Khmer and Thai support was limited and difficult-to-use, we arrived to the conclusion that a different way for encoding information had to be devised.